


Wait, Never Mind

by Cooked_Rat



Category: Cyberpunk 2077 (Video Game)
Genre: M/M, Relic Malfunction, Street Kid V (Cyberpunk 2077), Tarot Card Symbolism, Will They or Wont They of the Century, alcohol use, morality?, unbetaed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2020-12-21
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:02:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28182864
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cooked_Rat/pseuds/Cooked_Rat
Summary: Sometimes, Johnny really was unbearable. V's life went to shit, and all he had left was this narcissistic asshole whose company actually might have saved him from extreme and bitter loneliness. How great. Johnny leaned in closer and V could actually feel him in a distinct way. It was strange knowing what he was seeing and sensing wasn’t actually happening outside of his head, but in times like this it really did feel like it was happening in the physical world. It made him dizzy. Before Johnny did anything, he turned his head away and grabbed the beer from V’s hand, taking a swig himself.AKA Johnny and V like to argue and also are maybe a little too close to be just friends??? idk, I don't control them.
Relationships: Johnny Silverhand/Male V
Comments: 6
Kudos: 68





	Wait, Never Mind

**Author's Note:**

> Local bisexual man hyperfixates on a futuristic video game with an anarchist dilf, what will he do?! Write a fic, of course.  
> This is mainly to get a feel for the characters before I get a new laptop and am able to speed out an in depth fic to my liking. Please comment to give me feedback or to talk about these bastards. xx  
> 

He cannot be _fucking_ serious.

“We aren’t doing some split custody shit over my body like divorced parents. It’s _my_ goddamn body, Johnny!” The sound of a fly being zipped closed followed. V pushed through Johnny and out of his bathroom. The second V had finally been able to relieve himself in his own home had been something he was looking forward to through the past week. Too many damn jobs to get through, even running into one of those creepy cyberpsychos on his way home. The fact that he was even looking forward to taking a piss in his own toilet was aggravating. And just when V started to entertain the possibility of unwinding, Johnny fucking Silverhand decides to materialize right in the door way. He can’t even piss in peace anymore!

“Jesus V, it isn’t that big of a deal!” Johnny groans out after him, “It’s gonna be mine one day anyways so just let me take the reins for a while! Get to know what I’m dealing with.”

“All the more reason for me to keep it to myself as long as I can.” V had tumbled his way into the open space of his apartment, staying near a far wall and putting as much space between himself and Johnny, as if that would stop him. He reached into his bag and pulled out a beer, cracking it open. It wasn’t that late, maybe around eight or so. Some alcohol could do him some good, might even make Johnny a little more bearable. One could only hope. Johnny turned to lean on the doorway of the bathroom as V twisted his head to look at him. God, he hated how unreadable Johnny was. His emotions were always hidden under a layer of sarcasm and fury. Johnny Silverhand, all calm and cool, until someone made him increasingly angry, which definitely wasn’t rare. This motherfucker, always so damn full of himself. Well, at least V had the upper hand in most cases. Kind of. “What do you need my body for anyways? Blowing shit up? Breaking into Arasaka and getting flatlined again?” He lifted the opening of the beer to his mouth and felt the cool liquid flow over his tongue. Not his drink of choice, but the first thing he could grab. He watched Johnny’s reaction over the lip of the bottle. He thinks he might have hit a mark, but then again, the scowl present on Johny’s face is there almost all the time.

“I forgot what it _feels_ like.”

“What _what _feels like?”__

__“Having a body! Interacting with things, living my own life.” Johnny steps away from the doorway, starting to pace. _Greeeat_ , V thinks, _now I’ve started him on a tangent_. “Being able to talk to whoever I fucking wanted, punch whoever I wanted, _fucking_ whoever I wanted!” His hands were balled into fists and his shoes made an annoying squeak whenever he changed directions. “But now I’m stuck in your body,” Squeak. “and _I_ have to go along with whatever dumb shit you decide to take on.” Squeak. “I didn’t ask for this either V! You-”_ _

__“Yeah, I know. I saw your memories.”_ _

__“No, V, you don’t understand what it’s like to lose everything and wake up fifty years later in some kid’s head who knows fuck all about what he’s doing.”_ _

__“I’m not a fucking kid. And secondly, to play by your logic, you don’t know what it’s like to learn that your own sense of self will cease to exist in a matter of weeks or even days!” V could feel his voice reverberating in his chest. He halfheartedly tried not to raise his voice, but found it hard to hold back. He rolled his eyes and leaned his head back against the wall, “I lost my best fucking friend to all this bullshit and now I’m stuck with some Rockerboy trying to take my body, the only damn thing I have left.” V knew Johnny hated being seen as some lowlife nobody. As far as he’s concerned, he’s the greatest damn thing to walk the planet, the one person successful enough to make a dent in Arasaka’s plans.The only way Johnny can still affect the outside world is through V practically turning into him, and knowing he needs to work in complete tandem with another person aggravates him to no end. That, V was sure of._ _

__“Poor Johnny, left for dead on the roof of Arasaka only to get bested by Adam Smasher.” V took another swig from the beer before dropping his head to stare at his hands, red and scratched up from his recent jobs. Yeah okay, maybe that did cross a line and V shouldn’t have said that, but he’s pissed off. Everyone says things they don’t mean when they’re angry, just ask Johnny. V winced. Yeah, maybe he wasn’t helping. The pettiness of the conversation was getting tiring. Time to move forward._ _

__“Alright, let’s quit the pity party crap. It’s not a competition.” But sometimes it sure seemed like it._ _

__“Either way, I’m not giving up my body. Dunno if I can keep you from forcing your way through, but right now?” Johnny stopped pacing. “It’s a strong no.” V made sure to look into Johnny’s eyes for the last few words. Johnny sure as hell hated authority and people holding anything over him, but when it came to V he didn’t seem to have that same kind of push back. If V made a shitty choice that Johnny strongly went against, he didn’t do anything besides talk his ear off the next hour about what he would have done instead and why he’s so fucking grand. Johnny hadn’t tried to really kill him since that first day he showed up. Maybe he accepted his fate, but V doubted it._ _

__Johnny had his arms crossed, assessing what V had just said (and thankfully, not pacing anymore). Obviously, what V said wasn’t in his favor, but really no matter what happened someone would suffer in some way. This parasitic relationship was not bound to last, it was bound to destroy. That was the whole purpose behind Arasaka’s design. And nothing V or Johnny did alone could solve that problem. Johnny glitched out, blue strips of code left in his wake. Then, he reappeared right beside V, his side rested on the wall with his arms still crossed. Now he had his aviators on. V kept his head facing forward, not necessarily wanting to fully acknowledge Johnny’s presence, but not taking his eyes off of him. “Have it your way, V.” He sighed. As he leaned closer to V’s face, he reached up to grab the flimsy metal temples to lower the glasses down the bridge of his nose. “I’ll drop it for now.” V hated when Johnny got this close, and oh, did he know it. Unlike Johnny, V’s emotions were very easily read. They were painted on his face as clear as day. It’s one of his more obvious weaknesses, one Jackie would comment on often enough where it became a problem. Jackie always knew when he was upset, but he also always knew how to make it better. He was the closest damn thing V had to family in Night City and he’s gone for good. No more Jackie._ _

__And all he had left was this narcissistic asshole whose company actually might have saved him from extreme and bitter loneliness. How great._ _

__Johnny knew the temptation he created in people, and V wasn’t exactly immune. Johnny leaned in closer and V could actually _feel_ him in a distinct way. It was strange knowing what he was seeing and sensing wasn’t actually happening outside of his head, but in times like this it really did feel like it was happening in the physical world. It made him dizzy. It was always easier to pretend that maybe Johnny was some kind of figment of his imagination, some fucked up imaginary friend. But the harsh reality always jolted him awake from any of those ideas dancing around in his deteriorated brain. Before Johnny did anything, he turned his head away and grabbed the beer from V’s hand, taking a swig himself. V felt the beer in his mouth, washing down the vile taste of something he didn’t want to acknowledge just yet. Johnny stepped away without another look at V, throwing the beer behind him as he disintegrated once again along with the beer. Retreating back into wherever the fuck he goes when he isn’t bothering V. _ _

__“Sure, asshole.” V hissed, looking down at his hands and finding his beer still there. He didn’t question it, he didn’t care how it worked. Right now, he just wanted to get blasted and stay in, maybe read some messages he had been ignoring. Hell, he didn’t know how long he would be able to sleep in his own bed and not in the back of his car or on a friend’s couch. He never had the energy to go home right after jobs, plus it’s more likely for Silverhand to show up when he’s alone, which had become less of a negative thing recently. Although, sometimes Johnny does like to pop in during conversations with other people to fuck with V’s mind and make him feel like his head is being split in two. Well, it kind of is, isn’t it? V huffs out a breath of air and shakes his head. He downed the last of his beer and lifted his bag to find another one._ _

__

__~~~_ _

__

__Eventually, V had dug through his bag and various parts of the apartment and managed to find harder liquor. Some crude vodka he didn’t remember purchasing, he might have nabbed it off of a dead body of sorts, but he really didn’t care about the specifics._ _

__Drunk enough, V found himself slumped on his couch, watching some mundane programming on his TV. He didn’t remember dragging himself there but it couldn’t have been too hard, it was really just a few steps away. He liked being drunk. Not as much as he liked being high, but it was still pleasant enough that he continued to do it on his downtime. He did actually end up going through some missed messages and had the right mind not to answer any of them that didn’t really need answering. He didn’t want to cause any problems for himself in the morning or foster any more confusion for the senders._ _

__When V got to Misty’s messages, he was a little confused. She said something about “cleansing” and “taking it seriously”, which really took way too long for V to understand what she was talking about. But then he remembered that she had given him a set of tarot cards to read himself a few days back as he stopped by Viktor’s. He remembered all the tarot cards spray painted around Night City that he went to find out of curiosity, and tried to recall all of what she had said about them. Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, he couldn’t make out much of anything. He set the bottle of liquor he had been holding down, declaring that he had definitely drank enough for one night. He pulled his bag over from where it had been thrown onto the edge on the couch and sifted through the various junk until he found a small black box labelled “tarot”. Thankfully easy to find._ _

__He more or less skimmed through Misty’s messages because they were actually quite thorough and he couldn’t make out half of the words, but he reasoned it couldn’t be too hard. Turns out it was that hard. V had only pulled them out of the box when he realized that he didn’t know what he was looking at or how to continue with the process. So, in his confusion, he just decided to go through them one by one and look at the pictures. They were actually remarkably detailed, or that’s what he decided in his drunken stupor, anyways._ _

__V really should have expected Johnny to appear again, maybe using a time like this where his sharpness and apprehensiveness was dulled to his advantage. But really there was a small part of him that was glad to see Johnny. Johnny was always there, which of course was a little disconcerting at times, but he didn’t need to tell him anything. Johnny has seen parts of his memories. He’s seen things V had even closed off from his own mind, determined not to see them again. Johnny probably knows him more than any of the new friends he’s made on his way to get rid of the faulty chip in his skull._ _

__He really hates Johnny, or at least he thinks he might. At least a little bit. He hates how he gets under his skin. He hates how he never shuts up until you actually want him to say something, anything. And he most certainly hates how smug he looks when he knows he’s right._ _

__“Really, how hard is it to read those?” Johnny asks insincerely, flashing into existence as he sits down on the small table where V was looking at the cards. They were spread out, the one he was about to look at next was now trapped under Johnny’s thigh. Annoying, but hopefully his presence was somewhat welcome._ _

__“That’s what I said,” he motioned to the cards sprawled on the table and at his feet, “but as you can see...” Johnny didn’t even look mildly affected by the alcohol when V looked at him. He looked sober as ever, and when V plainly showed his confusion on his face, Johnny had the gall to look amused._ _

___Yes, grace me with your immense knowledge, oh great and all-knowing Johnathan Silverhand_. God, give him a break._ _

__“Just because you’re drunk, doesn’t mean I am.” He crossed his arms. The shitty apartment lighting actually framed his face really well. It was ominous and yet soft, the view from below him made him look like some kind of important figure in a movie. The hero? The villain?_ _

__“How does that even-”_ _

__“None of it would make sense even if some big-brained corporat explained it to us, V.” His tone of voice was off somehow. Softer, maybe. V really hated not being able to read him. Didn’t they share a brain or something? All of this should make way more sense and yet…_ _

__V sighed, setting the previous card down and sinking back into the couch. He closed his eyes, feeling the way the world still tilted even if he tried shutting off his senses. He knew Johnny was still there, watching him like always and giving him that weird ghostly sensation. When Johnny had first shown up, V had felt unnerved. Some famous rockerboy was now a part of him, devouring his mind in order to turn it into his own. But, it seemed to start to comfort him over time. Maybe it was his sick dilapidated head talking, but _fuck_ it does feel good not to be so alone anymore. Yes, his very presence signaled the end of V as a person, but it was easier to come to terms with when it was happening to someone else as well. _ _

__V cracked his eyes open. Johnny was looking at one of the tarot cards with curious intensity. V sat back up, craning his neck to see which one Johnny had been looking at, but before he could, he felt an aggressive shock in the back of his skull._ _

___Seriously?_ Another goddamn attack? He started to feel little jolts of electricity starting at the port where the chip was inserted and pulsating outwards in little veins through the rest of his head. V brought his hands up to his face and hoped this one wouldn’t be as bad as the other ones. He squeezed his head between his palms as his eyesight went fuzzier. He just wanted the pulsing to subside, the violent vibrations to stop before it got worse. “Fuuuuck” He managed to groan out, seeing Johnny’s head flick over before V squeezed his eyes shut. He could feel his body tightening, bracing for the attack. He felt his stomach contract, his body lurched forward towards the table. The buzzing started then, zapping and scrambling everything in his brain until the only thing he could think about was how he might just flatline here and now. It was too much._ _

__But then there was something else. It was warm. He’d felt it before but not as intense or so _real_ and direct. It felt like a hand, and arm. It was Johnny. He was holding V up, preventing him from falling. It was hard, definitely his metal arm, but it wasn’t as cold as he expected it to be. It didn’t make him want to jolt away, it actually comforted him. Johnny had his arm stretched across V’s face, his hand resting on his other shoulder while his arm brushed against him. It was almost some sort of cradle, in a distanced sort of way. Johnny’s ganic arm came to the back of his closest shoulder, giving more support. Of course V couldn’t appreciate the nice gesture in the moment necessarily, given that all of the synapses in his brain felt like they were being ripped apart and then reconnected again. But, that feeling… was it safety? Did he truly feel safe being held by a terrorist who had once burned half the city?_ _

__So what if he did? These moral quandaries don’t exist in Night City. It’s a fucked up world. The people are fucked up. But shitty choices are the only thing worth value. Not morality, but what someone does with what they were given, what is in their ability to change. Johnny said something like that once. V’s choices have led him here, and so have Johnny’s._ _

__At least the attack wasn’t too long. It didn’t seem as horrific as the other ones had been, but then again maybe the alcohol had helped with some of the pain. God, he’s so fucking tired. He took his hands away from his face and caught a small glimpse of concern on Johnny’s face before he steeled it into his usual flat expression. Apparently Johnny can’t manage to be vulnerable for two whole seconds. His arms slipped away along with the warmth, and V ached for it to return._ _

__On one hand, he felt grateful towards Johnny for actually helping him, even if it might not have been his intention to. On the other hand, it was annoying that Johnny can act like a borderline functioning adult and other times act like a downright child. V also found it annoying that he actually had some semblance of affection for him._ _

__But for the time being, V really had to throw up. Standing up was a chore (one that Johnny did not help with) but he was eventually able to straighten up. He stepped carefully over Johnny’s legs, but stopped once he could face him head on._ _

__V pointed his finger at him, leaned one of his hands on Johnny’s shoulders, and got real close. And then he started smiling, because he thought of something absolutely hilarious. The absurdity of it all, these past weeks, built up inside him and he really found it funny. He thought about doing something, something he would never do sober. Maybe it was too soon. V watched Johnny tilt his head up, his expression open and maybe even welcoming. Something he had hardly ever seen on Johnny’s face, if ever. “Thanks, Johnny-” But before he could even act on what he was thinking, a spike of nausea dug deep into his stomach and roared its ugly head. Hunching over, he turned away quickly from Johnny, although his bile would probably pass right through him, V doesn’t really want to chance it. V slipped away, stumbling to the bathroom just in time to spew his guts right down the toilet. His body and mind are a total clusterfuck of sickness and his body is desperately trying to cope. Even in the midst of relieving himself of the cheap alcohol he had been drinking, he faintly remembers the cool touch of something like metal against his back while he crouched by the toilet._ _

__

__~~~_ _

__

__In the morning, V’s headache was bad but not the worst he’d ever gotten. It wasn’t unbearable, but it certainly wasn’t ideal either. As he reached for his glass of water on the nightstand, his hand touched something else. It was a piece of paper, stiff and smooth. He grabbed it as delicately as he could and brought it up to his face, letting his eyes adjust to the light. It was a tarot card. One of a drawing of a tower with blistering fire spouting from its windows, a great cacophony of colors and imagery. There were people leaping from the tower as well, escaping the fire only to lose themselves to sharp rocks jutting out of the ground. It was chaotically beautiful._ _

__

____

__In the morning, V’s headache was bad but not the worst he had ever had. It wasn’t unbearable, but it wasn’t ideal either. As he reached for his glass on water on the nightstand, his hand hit something else. It was a piece of paper. Stiff. He grabbed it and brought it up to his face, letting his eyes adjust to the light. It was a tarot card. One with a picture of a tower with fire bolstering from its windows, a great cacophony of colors and imagery. It was chaotically beautiful._ _

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed! I have an extremely long entry in my notes app dedicated to fic ideas for these two with more characters and (hopefully) can turn out a much longer fic. Yes I have been writing fics for around 2 years and no I haven't uploaded most of them....... we exist.  
> 


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